Mammoth by Eva Baltasar
A GUARDIAN BOOK TO LOOK OUT FOR 2024
AN OBSERVER BOOK TO LOOK OUT FOR 2024
A NEW STATESMAN BOOK TO LOOK OUT FOR 2024
Mammoths protagonist is a disenchanted young lesbian. Shes inexperienced, irritated by life, eager to gestate, and determined to strip everything else down to essentials. She seduces men at random, swaps her urban habitat for an isolated farmhouse, befriends a shepherd, nurses lambs, battles stray cats, waits tables, cleans house, and dabbles in sex work - all in pursuit of life in the raw.
This small bomb of a novel, not remotely pastoral, builds to a howling crescendo of social despair, leaving us at the mercy of Eva Baltasars wild voice.